Her family has money.I know there’s a big trust that has paid out to some of the other siblings when they’ve needed something monumental, and a couple of the eldest have already received payouts from it because—I’m not making this up—they had the required minimum number of children.
Yeah.It’s likethat.
Needless to say, I’ve tried to stay out ofthatdiscussion, because I don’t want to draw additional scrutiny on us and our childless status.Neither does Olivia.
My father and hers worked out the prenup and I signed off on it after looking it over.Whatever negotiations occurred between them, I know better than to ask my father.He’d probably lie to me anyway.My suspicion is that there’s an age clause in Olivia’s family’s trust to trigger her payout, in case she doesn’t have kids, but again, I’m not asking.
It wouldn’t be my money, anyway.
Just like the money in my father’s trust can’t be touched by her.Between the rules of the trust, and our prenup, she doesn’t get any of it.
Part of me hopes she’ll cheat on me.I wouldn’t even ding her with the clause in the prenup, if she’d just quietly divorce me and cite irreconcilable differences, or something like that.Hell, I’ll even let her tell everyone I can’t have kids and she wants them.
Then again, I could just divorce her now.
Who am I kidding, though?I’ve never stood up to my father.
Especially not after realizing he had a hand in Mom’s death.
As long as I do what he tells me to and he doesn’t hear rumors of me talking badly about him—I don’t—he leaves me alone for the most part.He wants me to have kids, too, but not because he’s interested in grandchildren.
He’s the last of his family, the only child, and wants me to multiply so his “legacy” can live on.
Legacy?Is he fucking crazy?
Yeah, like I want to reproduce that evil bastard’s DNA.
Hard pass.
Outside, I hear a rumble of thunder from a line of approaching storms.Greeaaat.I wanted to skip church and the lunch today, but Olivia insisted despite the shitty incoming weather.
God, do me a favor, and strike this church with lightning, please?Or a tornado.I’m not picky.Thanks.
Becca, one of her older sisters, walks up to us after the service.Because we drive from so far away, sometimes, we get stuck in traffic and can’t sit with the rest of her family.
Oh, darn.
Did you hear the sarcasm?
Becca’s five months pregnant with like her fifth kid or something.I’ve lost track.I’m sorry, but when I have to take off my socks and shoes to count nieces and nephews because I’ve run out of fingers, you’re on your own.
“We gonna see y’all at lunch, right?”Becca asks Olivia, eyeing me.
I nod and feign smiling.“Sure will.”Becca never has been fond of me.
The feeling’s mutual.
“Oh, good.”She hugs Olivia and waddles off to another sister.
Olivia grabs my arm, like she’s holding on to me, but she pinches the inside of it, forcing me to mask my wince.But she’s not nearly as big a sadist as Liam was.
“Be nice.”
“I’m always nice,” I snark.“It’s not my fault they hate me for you not being knocked up thirteen months out of every year.Unless you’d rather change that?”
She glares at me, but the comment shuts her up every time.
* * * *
